mark palm medevac surfing pilot interview life

Surfing is full of characters. Most of them are selfish, wave-hogging bros. Then there are the ones like Mark Palm, a life saving medevac pilot operating in Papua New Guinea. Of course he gets some waves as well, but that’s not what it’s all about. There are others as well, like Waves4Water founder Jon Rose.

Here’s a sample:

In 2010, Samaritan Aviation, a nonprofit organization based out of Montrose, Colorado, brought the very first floatplane to a country dominated by water. And for the last six years this Cessna, piloted mostly by Palm, has served as the only efficient link between life-threatening events and medical treatment. Palm, a surfer from Santa Cruz, California, said he didn’t come here for the waves. That he discovered a variety of reefs and beaches was a lucky strike he attributes to God looking after him. Because the reason he says he came, to serve others, can get pretty grim.

In the sky, the aircraft felt light and pliable, but as soon as the pontoons touched upon the surface chops, it revealed itself as rigid and chattering. A pair of dugout canoes launched from the village. Each was about as wide as a man’s hips. I counted nine people in the slender dugout that carried the patient. Cooke stepped out of the cabin and onto a pontoon. “You go hurry up in here,” he shouted.

Palm then noticed that the wind had pushed the plane toward a mat of lake reeds. If stuck, extricating the pontoons from the reeds would cost time. He restarted the engine. The plane and dugouts parted like sticks on a river. A game of catch-up ensued. “We’re going to get rained on,” Palm said. The second attempt to dock with the dugouts went quickly, however. Cooke and the men loaded the woman into the cabin. We were also joined by a caretaker. This woman explained that Clara, the patient, had been in the aircraft before. The first instance was due to a complicated pregnancy. The baby had not survived, which made this run, another difficult pregnancy, all the more dire. Both lives were on the line. Palm turned the floatplane into the wind, and as the pontoons skipped from wake to wake, it slowly gained lift. The lake below receded and then joined a patchwork of swamps and oxbows that stretched away to the central mountains.

“That was an interesting one,” Cooke said.